The 49th Mystic by Ted Dekker

Author:Ted Dekker
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Suspense;Fiction;Women prophets—Fiction;Christian fiction;FIC042060;FIC031070
ISBN: 9781493414017
Publisher: Baker Publishing Group
Published: 2018-03-16T04:00:00+00:00

19

I HAD INSISTED that my father wait two hours, and if he’d listened, none of it would have happened. But Shadow Man had worked his way into his mind and convinced him that stories of other worlds were nonsense. More, he had an obligation to defend the honor of his wife. Justice had to be served—that was the only story he was listening to here.

I didn’t blame him. My father was dutifully following what hundreds of years of social conditioning, bound in polarity, had taught him.

I stood frozen, smothered by fear.

“Father?” It was Peter talking, but Simon wasn’t listening to his son. “Father!”

Barth reached my father then, just as Peter’s last warning echoed through the sanctuary. My father met him halfway, rushing forward with his bat cocked. Then swinging.

But to a man who made defense his life, a baseball bat might as well be a twig. With catlike quickness, Barth sidestepped the bat, took one step, and slugged my father in the face while he was off balance.

“No!” My feet found themselves. I moved without conscious calculation, only one thought in mind: Barth was going to kill my father.

Three strides down the center aisle, I decided the long way around wouldn’t do. I leaped to the backs of the pews and flew across them, two at a time, eyes focused on the bull who was just now turning back.

Five more long strides and I was there. But Barth was far faster than any man his size should be, even caught off guard by the sight of a sixteen-year-old girl sprinting toward him on the backs of pews.

He scooped up my father’s fallen bat and swung at me as I launched off the last seat. I was already in flight, and if not for his swing, my heels would have struck his head.

But there was that swing. A vicious strike at the end of two powerful arms that would have broken my body in two.

I threw my head forward and shifted my weight to execute an aerial flip up and over the bat. Air buffeted the back of my head as I rolled forward. I twisted midflight and landed light on both feet, facing his unprotected back.

But Barth was fast. Blindingly fast, bringing the bat around as he turned, putting his full weight into his second swing. A low swing aimed at the skinny young girl who’d somehow gotten behind him.

I could have stepped into his arms and brought my palm up under his chin, but I went high, leaping up, two feet above the bat. Then shoving my heel forward, toward his thick head.

The rubber sole of my right Converse slammed into his face. I heard a crack and knew I’d broken his nose. Then I was on both feet again, bouncing back to create space, and for the first time thinking rather than simply reacting.

On my left, my father was trying to get his feet under him, grabbing for the dropped billy club.

In front of me, blood was pouring from Barth’s broken nose.

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